Old Wounds
by Chiroptera Jones
Summary: Cullen was aware, of course, that Hawke was in Skyhold, and he'd been trying his best to avoid the apostate. They had been united against a common enemy when last they met, but there was too much bad blood, and seeing him reminded Cullen of the person he used to be. Unfortunately, Hawke himself had other plans - and bones both old and new to pick with Cullen.


Cullen blew into his cupped hands, trying to warm them, and paced along the outer wall. He looked out across the valley; a magnificent day, admittedly, despite the cold. Snow swept past in little flurries and melted instantly on the grey stones of the walls and on his sleeves.

"Hey."

He smiled without looking around. "My lady," he greeted the Herald, and turned. "Fine weather today."

"Avoiding the noble delegation again?" Kelwin asked. "You can't hide from Josephine forever. You _are_ going to have to greet them."

"That comment would sting more," he said dryly, "If you weren't up here hiding _with_ me."

She inclined her head, conceding the point with a smile, and came to stand beside him in the lee of the building, out of the wind. He snugged an arm around her waist, and she leaned against him. She was comfortingly solid against him, keeping the icy wind out and warming that whole side of his body.

"It's not that I mind, really," she said, her eyes looking out into the wilderness, wandering slightly as they followed eddies of wind and the movement of trees. "I just needed to step out for a minute; I could feel myself getting all tongue-tied and dopey. Figured I'd better take a break before I put my foot in my mouth about something."

Cullen nodded, his hand resting on her hip. "I know the feeling."

"Mm."

Strands of her hair were tickling his neck. Cullen smiled and stroked the back of his fingers down her cheek.

"Sorry, am I interrupting something?"

Cullen stiffened, and stepped away from Kelwin. He turned to face the person who'd spoken, and his resigned sigh froze in his throat.

"Hawke," Kelwin said cheerfully. "It's good to see you. I missed you at the dinner last night."

The Champion of Kirkwall looked little different; more scars, more lines about his eyes and mouth. Otherwise he could have stepped right out of Cullen's memory. Those lines deepened in a smile as he bowed to Kelwin. "I am, sadly, not a very popular person with many of your guests, Inquisitor. Perhaps another time." His gaze slid sideways, and he grinned as they found Cullen. "Well, look who it is. You look different, Cullen!" Hawke regarded him with his head tipped to one side for a moment. "It's awful."

Cullen hissed out a breath between his teeth. "Champion Hawke," he said tightly. "I understand we have a common goal again. I'm sure your skills will be up to the task."

"So am I," Hawke said, that insufferable grin fixed on his face.

"Oh – you and the Champion have worked together, Cullen?" Kelwin turned to him, nothing but pleased surprise in her eyes. "Oh – that's right, Varric did mention…"

Maker, what kind of things did Varric tell her about the Kirkwall mage rebellion? It gnawed at Cullen, sometimes, in the small hours of the morning, listening to the wind whistle around Skyhold when he couldn't sleep.

Kelwin was a clever woman, not given to sensationalism or credulity. And she hadn't _participated_ in the Mage Rebellion. As such. But… still, sometimes, she spoke of Hawke with that tinge of awe in her voice. Champion of the mages of the Gallows. Almost more than human. The Champion will protect the mages, surely, protect them from the Templar Order…

Cullen wasn't sure whether he should be relieved that he himself didn't seem to feature excessively in the dwarf's stories.

"I was Knight-Captain in Kirkwall," he said, managing to keep his voice level. "Hawke and I… had cause to work together on several matters there, before the situation degenerated."

"That's certainly one way of describing it," Hawke said, matching Cullen's serious tone.

"Hawke, did you remember something else about Corypheus?" Kelwin said, a frown touching her mouth. The wind blew her copper hair back. The tip of her freckled nose was pink from cold; Cullen wanted to wrap a scarf around her.

Hawke shook his head. "Oh, no. Just out enjoying the weather up here," he said. He gave Cullen a broad smile. "Bracing, isn't it? Don't mind me."

He turned, much to Cullen's temporary relief – but he only went as far as the other side of the wall, to gaze out over Skyhold's grounds. He folded his arms on the top of one of the crenellations, and propped one foot on the toe of his boot. Making it clear he wasn't going anywhere.

Kelwin shot Cullen a look of mingled exasperation and amusement. Cullen couldn't bring himself to return it. To her, this was banal, one of the normal little frustrations of life as a leader and a very public figure. Quiet conversation of theirs being interrupted was a daily occurrence.

"I had better go back down," she said. "The Inquisitor's presence is doubtless required."

"I – yes," Cullen agreed. "I'm sure it is. I mean, I'm sure you are. I will… see you later."

She smiled at him, and he spared a moment to watch her legs as she turned and started down the stairs. _At least she took the stairs this time,_ he thought distantly.

He looked up. Hawke was lounging right beside the doorway that he needed to go through to get back to his office. His braid flapped and tangled around the carved head of the staff he carried slung across his back. Cullen gritted his teeth, resettled his coat and stepped forward. What, was he too cowardly to walk past the apostate?

Hawke turned his head. "So it's true," he said, lifting one eyebrow. "I wasn't sure if Varric was pulling one of his hilarious tricks. It's something he'd do, and I thought Lady Trevelyan had better taste. Is that _wise_ , Knight-Captain?"

"I'm not Knight-Captain," Cullen said automatically. "I have left the Templar Order. And in any case-" _My personal life is none of your business, or the business of that dwarf._ He had stopped, and Hawke unfolded himself to stand in front of the door.

" _Right._ Commander of the Inquisition, now, I hear? Congratulations. You seem to have a knack for failing upwards."

"Hawke," Cullen said, taking a deep breath. "We were never precisely close friends. But we were, for most of our acquaintance, at least allies. I would appreciate an effort to remain civil despite -"

"Would you? _Would_ you?" Hawke laughed. "Sorry, Cullen, I didn't come up here to find you just so I could be civil at you."

"You came looking for me? Why?"

Hawke shrugged. He unslung his staff, pulling it free with a loose shrugging motion and passing it from hand to hand nonchalantly. He leaned against the wall, as if that was the only reason he'd done it. "Perhaps I wanted to see if you'd changed at all."

Cullen found that his hand, without him willing it, was already on the hilt of his sword. His breath rasped in his throat suddenly and his heart was hammering.

"What _have_ you told the Inquisitor about Kirkwall, Cullen?" Hawke said, looking at him with narrowed eyes. He gestured with the staff. "Not to sound arrogant, but I feature pretty prominently in the sequence of events. So if you haven't spoken about me, what else have you left out? It sounds like you've told her very little."

Cullen found his feet shifting into a position better suited for – not even for defence, he realised, for offense. He was a hair's breadth away from drawing the sword and lunging. Lyrium hunger hit him in a pang, making his throat dry and his head ache sharply.

He forced himself to breathe deeply, swallow, push back the panic. _You are not in danger. You don't need it. You don't need it. You have time to think._

Not in danger, when a mage stood in front him with his staff out? Emery Hawke, the most notorious apostate in his city? Cullen was to believe he was not in danger?

 _Hawke is not going to attack you on the walls of your own fortress,_ he told himself sternly. _However much he might play at it, he's not a fool._ _There are Inquisition soldiers everywhere, not to mention the Inquisitor herself. And Hawke came here to ally with us._

Hawke was watching him. "Sorry. Is this bothering you, Cullen?" he said, throwing the staff up with one hand and catching it again, showy and graceful.

"No," Cullen lied, making himself let go of the sword hilt. "It is somewhat rude of you, of course, but I am fine. Why shouldn't I be?"

"Because mages scare the shit out of you," Hawke said. "And now here you are, working for an organisation that not only includes free mages but is _led_ by one. How are you dealing with that?"

"Well, the Herald generally has the courtesy not to carry her staff around Skyhold and point it at people during conversations," Cullen said. _Why_ could he not stop his heart from racing?

Hawke stood up straight, and made a show of putting the staff away again and showing his empty hands. "Better? More _civil_? You know I don't need the staff if I want to take you, Cullen."

"Excuse me?" Cullen demanded. The wind gusted, a few ice crystals stinging Cullen's face. "Hawke, this is hardly the time for such posturing. You are making a fool of yourself."

"I don't think I am," Hawke said. He stepped back, and began to walk slowly, tracing a circle around Cullen. "I have some grievances to raise with you _, Knight-Captain Cullen_. When you finally summoned the spine to turn on Meredith, I was so relieved at that sign of decency that I was ready to forgive or overlook a lot of things." Hawke's face turned momentarily grim. "A lot of things that really shouldn't be forgiven or overlooked."

Cullen pivoted to keep Hawke in front of him. "You must be joking," he said flatly. "Whatever grudge you bear, you can't think you'll be allowed to settle it here. We are surrounded by my soldiers."

Hawke laughed, in that disconcerting way he had. "You're mistaken," he said. "I don't want to _kill_ you, Cullen! I just want to take you and your dear lady Herald back to the Gallows and rub your nose in all the horrific shit that went on there, and ask you to repeat all the things you've been mouthing about peace and compromise. I don't think I can do that, either, though I -"

"Again with Kelwin," Cullen snarled. Panic fluttered around in his chest, making him angrier than he had wanted to be. "My personal life is my business! It is none of yours! If you have these grievances, then air them if you must. I don't see what Lady Trevelyan has to do with them."

"She's a _mage_ , Cullen! Maker's breath!"

Cullen swallowed, stepped back. "I – I don't care. It doesn't matter to me."

"It _doesn't matter to you?"_ Hawke looked incredulous. His hands balled into fists at his sides. He turned his back, suddenly, striding across the bare stone and throwing his arms out in a furious gesture as if to appeal to an imaginary room of people. "You liar. Of course it matters to you."

"I don't see why you –"

"You know, Cullen, the more I got to know you the less I liked you," Hawke said, wheeling around to face him again. "But I never thought you were _that_ type of templar."

"What type of templar?" Cullen demanded.

"The type with a sick fixation on mages," Hawke said.

"With _a wh-"_

"Like Ser Karras, or Ser Alrik. You know, when Anders first told me about templars like that, I thought he was _exaggerating_? Then I met Alain, and…" Hawke struggled to speak for an instant, his face twisting. He gave up and made an incoherent gesture with his hand. " _Damn it._ "

Cullen blinked at him, hair blowing in the wind. "Alain? Who…"

A flurry of snowflakes drifted between the two of them. Hawke's head snapped up. "Who indeed," he said bitingly. "Only a Circle mage, of course. That's all. I shouldn't have expected you to remember they had names. You'll forgive me if he sticks rather in _my_ mind; there wasn't a time I visited you in your stinking Gallows I didn't wish I could take him out with me. I should never have let him go with you; he didn't realise what it meant."

Cullen frowned. A face came to him; dark eyes and a bowed head. He wasn't sure how, but the conversation seemed to have changed directions rapidly and he was on unstable footing. "You – you're speaking of the blood mage from Starkhaven?"

Hawke took a threatening step forward, fists clenched. "Don't you call him that!"

"Why not? It is true," Cullen said. "You can't deny that he –"

"Only once you gave him no other choice! And he repented!" Hawke laughed bitterly. "And I let you haul him off anyway. Hurrah for me."

More memories rose up: _the Starkhaven mage standing surrounded by bodies, his hands limp and bloody. That expression, lost and innocent, as if he didn't understand how this could be his fault. Looking over the gore-soaked scene as if to say,_ how did that happen _?_

 _Blood trickling down a split lip, those same blood-daubed hands shielding a_ _face_. _Retching and sobbing that went on, and on, and on, echoing down the stone corridors…_

"There will always be mages who claim they had 'no other choice' but to turn to blood magic," Cullen said, trying to shake the memories off. His hands and face were cold, all of a sudden. "It seems they view it as an inevitability. You accuse us of treating mages as though they will all fall to temptation, but it is the blood mages themselves who tell us so!"

"You're wrong," Hawke said. He began to pace, short angry steps that took him from the inner wall to the outer one. "Alain tried to play by the rules! You wasted so much time watching and hurting and stifling the _safe_ mages. Because I guess that was easier for you, it made you feel like you were _doing something_ , rather than…"

"Hawke, this is exactly the problem we always had when we tried to speak of blood mages," Cullen said wearily, putting a hand to his temple. His head ached sharply. "We never got anywhere because you simply have no understanding of the problems inherent in dealing with a large population of hostile mages. I don't claim to know why or who was to blame, but Kirkwall was rife with blood magic."

"Oh, I know exactly who to blame – "

"You know it was, don't try and deny it! You were the one who stepped in and foiled half of them! You certainly had no problems killing blood mages then." He glanced behind him, reassured that he had a wall to his back and could not be snuck up on.

"I have no love of blood magic," Hawke snarled, stopping dead. "Don't you try and claim any different. I'll kill a mage who threatens innocents the same as any other."

Cullen gritted his teeth. Snowflakes melted down the back of his neck, making him shift irritably. He folded his arms. "But oh, once you'd had your big dramatic confrontation with the maleficars and abominations, you could hand the survivors over to us and head back home to your mansion in Hightown. You didn't have to _live_ with it. You didn't have to weigh up the risks of letting a mage live, knowing they could spread their foul ideas, knowing that if you were wrong it could be dozens of deaths on your head."

He took a deep breath, then another. This was a familiar argument. He should not allow it to affect his equilibrium.

"I dealt with risks all the time," Hawke growled. "And yet, I got through most days without torturing and murdering people on the off chance they might one day hurt someone!"

"No, you don't, Hawke!" Cullen sighed. "You didn't. You never wanted any sort of official authority. Any sort of _responsibility_. You'd much rather flit about from one job to another and berate the people actually working to prevent disasters for not doing it to your satisfaction."

Hawke's face darkened. "Whatever else you say, Cullen, I'm not the man who spent seven years propping up a madwoman and upholding her campaign of imprisonment, torture and murder. How many of those you had killed or made Tranquil actually _were_ dangerous, Cullen? I'll be interested to know what your estimate is. What's the acceptable ratio of innocents to blood mages? Five to one? Ten to one? A hundred?"

A trickle of cold that had nothing to do with the weather crept into Cullen's guts. He closed his eyes _. I don't know_ , he thought. _I don't know how many were. All of them_ might _have been. I made more than one mistake by assuming they weren't dangerous and then discovering they were. How many times did I err in the other direction? More? Surely so. How many more?_

 _I will never know. I made my peace with not ever knowing. Didn't I?_

He opened his eyes, taking a deep breath, and spread his hands in a futile gesture. "Fine," he said, biting the words off sharply. "Is that what you wanted to say? Consider it said. I don't know why you think nobody has said that to me before, or that I haven't thought on my failures. I assure you, I have. At length."

Cullen made himself step forward as if nothing was wrong, as if he was going to brush past Hawke on his way down the stairs. He had important matters to see to; he couldn't spend all afternoon standing on freezing ramparts reliving the arguments of ten years ago with a dangerous apostate. When was he going to be able to put those years aside?

"I know people have said it to you," Hawke said. "I said it to you. You didn't listen then and I don't think you're listening now." He visibly seemed to pull himself away from the well-worn argument, bowing his shoulders slightly and putting a hand up to his temple. He took a deep breath, and then let it hiss out through his teeth. "But, we were speaking of Ser Karras, weren't we?"

"Were we? I don't know," Cullen snapped. "You keep changing the topic."

Ser Karras. He tried to recall the man and couldn't think of anything especially condemnable about him. He had been a rough sort, Cullen supposed, but reliable enough in a fight and unwavering in his duties. He certainly had had no taint of mage sympathies. Actually, he had been the one to recover the Starkhaven blood mages to start with, hadn't he?

"One more entry into the long book of things that I should have made you pay for," Hawke said, not getting in his way, just watching him with utter contempt. "You let Ser Karras and his like carry on as they pleased. After all, it was only mages, right? Probably going to need to be made Tranquil eventually, so who cares? I expect they deserved it, did they?"

Despite himself, Cullen paused. "Deserved _what_?" he demanded.

Hawke's face twitched. "You want it spelled out. All right. Abuse. Violation. _Rape_."

Cullen faltered, feeling like he'd been blown back by an icy blast, as though the words were a spell, although Hawke hadn't raised a hand or done any magic.

… _some kind of sick fixation on mages…_

He finally grasped what Hawke had been insinuating about his interest in Kelwin, distantly. He could feel his heart beating, in his chest and the back of his head and the fingers he closed into fists as he grappled with the ugliness of what Hawke was talking about.

"You're wrong," he said, turning to look at Hawke, the words coming straight from his gut out through his mouth. "That didn't - I never – "

The apostate drew himself up, his eyes burning. The wind tugged and flailed his plaited hair out to the side. "How dare you," he hissed. "How dare you stand there and tell me – do you hear yourself, Cullen?"

"No," Cullen said, his mouth dry. He felt sick. "None of my templars would have… We wouldn't, someone would have known… " It clawed at all of his instincts, but Cullen turned his back to the apostate, fixing his gaze out on whirling whiteness and wind-tossed trees. He swallowed. "Hawke – Hawke, do you have proof of these claims? Which – which templars do you…"

"Well, yes, someone _would_ have known," Hawke said, his voice dripping sarcasm. "It only went on for years under everybody's nose. I gave you names - Karras. Alrik. I can try and remember the others for you if you like. As for proof, well, I don't know of any Tranquil who survived the Annulment, so I can't produce one for you. But even if you distrust Alain, you should know Tranquil don't usually lie."

"Karras," Cullen repeated hollowly. The man had hated mages. He had made no secret of that. Cullen had not agreed with him all the time, nor even particularly liked the man, but he hadn't seen a problem in that at the time. He stared out at the trees without truly seeing them, thinking of all the times he had spoken with Ser Karras and Ser Alrik.

He wanted to accuse Hawke of lying. But he thought he knew, in the back of his mind, where he didn't ever like to acknowledge it, that such things were within the realms of possibility. And the Champion was many things, but Cullen didn't think he would lie about something like this.

Hawke snapped his fingers. "Answers aren't out there, Cullen! You don't have some kind of explanation? A glib justification about how harshness was necessary, how a firm hand would keep rebel factions in the Gallows pacified?"

"I – I didn't know about this," Cullen protested. "I didn't!" _Only rumours. Only gossip. Maker knows you can't take every dirty joke and piece of drunken gossip seriously. I didn't think it was important._

"Oh, right," Hawke sneered. Cullen could hear the scrape and clink of his clothing and knew he was moving around behind him. "You didn't know! His commanding officer, Knight-Captain of the whole bloody Gallows! It's not like it was your _job_ to know or anything."

"I was _not aware_ of any such activities going on while I was in command," Cullen snapped. He turned his head, ignoring the way the wind whistled past his ears now that he was out of the windbreak. "If I did, do you think I would have allowed it? Hawke, I know we've had our differences, but what kind of monster do you think I am?"

Hawke had unslung the staff again. Cullen searched Hawke's face, and found only a stony look. "I don't know, Cullen. You tell me."

"What did you imagine? That templars with such… tastes… were welcomed among us? That they spoke openly about doing such things? Did you picture us sitting around in the Gallows swapping tales of cruelty and degradation and congratulating one another?" Cullen shook his head, feeling a little sick. "If you say such things went on, then – then I will believe you," he said, the words bitter. "But they happened in secret."

"Right," Hawke said. He was watching Cullen with his eyes narrowed. Cullen saw he had his hands clasped tightly together two-thirds up the length of the staff. "You didn't know?"

"I swear it on Andraste," Cullen said. He swung around to look at the mage full-on. "Hawke, you think me the kind of person who would participate in that?"

Despite everything that had happened, despite the fact that Hawke had made his opinion of Cullen very clear… Cullen found that that upset him.

Hawke regarded him with a flat expression for a few moments, and then sighed. His hands relaxed around the staff. "Not participate. I suppose not. But you didn't stop it."

"I didn't _know_ about it to stop it."

"So if a mage came to you and told you of someone who _was_ that kind of templar, you would have listened and the templar would have been out on his ear. Is that what you'd have me believe?"

Cullen pressed his lips together. "If there was a plausible case…"

Hawke snorted. "Oh. Plausible. I see. How many implausible cases did you hear out?"

"I – " Cullen swallowed. "I don't… it was years ago, I cannot recall… the specifics of any such – I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"I have – perhaps I was – negligent," Cullen said. His eyes slid away from Hawke's. "I did not know. But you may be right. That I should have known. If I had paid more attention I might have seen it."

Hawke propped his staff up against his shoulder and made an extravagant gesture with the other hand. He turned his face up to the cloudy sky. "Maker be praised, we have seen a miracle! The words 'you may be right' have crossed Cullen Rutherford's lips!"

Cullen grimaced. "Hawke –"

"Truly, the lady Trevelyan must be sent to us from the Maker's own hand! Can any person doubt it now? See the portents that He sends to make His favour clear?"

"Hawke, enough." Cullen turned away. "I am not the man I used to be. Is that what you came here to find out? You wanted to hear me say I was wrong? What do you want?"

Hawke sighed. He walked away, over to the other side of the ramparts, and put his staff down. He waved a dismissive hand over the wall at Skyhold and the people thronging the grounds. "I _want_ for the head of the Inquisition's armed forces to be a man whose hands aren't stained with the blood of hundreds of mages. That's what I want." He leaned back against the wall with a clink, looking tired. He spoke softly. "I guess I missed my chance, didn't I? Because here you are, firmly ensconced near the top of the hierarchy again. Out of my reach."

Cullen followed him. "I left the templars. I joined the Inquisition, with the express purpose of stopping this senseless war," he said. "Is that not enough?"

Suddenly Hawke had launched forward, grabbed Cullen by the front of his coat, pushed him backwards with an openhanded shove. "Is it _enough_? No! It's not enough!"

Cullen reacted without thinking, his feet falling into combat stance as the apostate followed him. Hawke slammed into him, his weight pushing Cullen back one step, and another, until his heel and back hit the cold stone of the tower. He groped for power, for a burst of lyrium to dispel magic – but Hawke wasn't using magic, just the momentum of his body. Hawke's hand was clamped around his wrist, holding it straining as his sword trembled a few inches out of its sheath.

"I don't think you want to do that, Cullen," he grated, his face inches away. "Put your sword back."

"Let go," Cullen snarled.

"Is it enough? Is it enough! Cullen, do you really think what you've done over the past few years even comes _close_ to making up for Kirkwall? For even a _handful_ of the deaths? Leave alone all the rest!"

"I am trying!" Cullen said. He let go of the sword, let his hand fall limp. Despite himself, his voice wavered, choking on tears. "I am trying to fix the mess I helped create. I am trying, Hawke! I cannot go back and undo the past!"

"Try harder! Look at you, Cullen, you claim you've left the templars, but here you are still marching under the Chantry banner, still training up more templars, still watching every mage in your vicinity with your hand on your sword!" Hawke let go of Cullen, with a final shove, and spun out to face away from him. "Just waiting for this pesky war to die down so you can go back to the way things were before!"

"That is not true," Cullen said. He swayed, tried to steady his trembling legs. He kept his hand on the stone wall for support. "Things will not be the same. That isn't what I want."

"Isn't it?" Hawke shook his head. "You want the Circles back. Don't you? Does the _Herald_ agree?"

 _The Herald?_ Cullen swiped a shaking hand across his face. "I – I don't think so."

"You don't _think_ so?" Hawke looked at him, his face grim. If he was surprised to see Cullen bowed over, propping himself up with one hand, he didn't show it. "Cullen, I asked you a question before and you didn't answer me. How much does the Herald know about you and your history with Circle mages?"

"I – it's none of your business," Cullen managed to say. The stone was icy under his trembling fingers.

"You're lying to her," Hawke said disgustedly. "She doesn't know anything about you, does she, Cullen? She thinks she loves you."

"W-we have spoken on the matter. She is content with where we stand." The familiar guilt settled into his chest, making him feel hollow and queasy.

"So does she know how many mages you've killed, or not?"

" _She doesn't want or need to know that!_ "

"Oh, okay, then. What _did_ you speak about? The Right of Annulment? Surely you spoke of that! You were all for it!"

"No, I wasn't!" Cullen said desperately. "I never –"

"Have you spoken to her about the Rite of Tranquillity?" Hawke went on, relentlessly. "How many Harrowed mages underwent it in Kirkwall? How they used it as a punishment for everything from trying to escape to passing notes? About the _Tranquil Solution_?"

"I had _nothing_ to do with - "

"Have you talked about templars beating mages senseless and throwing them in their cells? For talking back?"

"Now, see here, I – "

"Does she know that you once said to me, _mages cannot be treated like people_? I've never forgotten that line, it made rather an…"

"I no longer believe that!"

"Apprentices drawing lots to see who'd be punished that week. Karras and all the templars like him, hurting mages just because they were there and he could –"

"That wasn't supposed to happen!" Cullen cried. "None of it was supposed to happen! It wasn't right and I didn't intend for things to go that far! I wanted things to be safe and orderly and I didn't want _any_ of those things!"

"Then how did it _keep – on – happening_?" Hawke demanded. "How?"

"I – I -" Cullen sagged suddenly. "I don't know."

"You don't know? The fuck kind of answer is that?"

"I don't know!" Cullen worked fingers into his hair. "I – I just – There were so many mages, more than we could… "

There had been so much at once. So many things to keep his mind on. His subordinates to manage, Orsino and his politicking, blood mages to hunt out and apostates to pursue, the Circle mages to watch over, suspect templars to investigate, lyrium, the ever-growing, ever-changing list of things Meredith needed. He could not watch every templar and every mage. "I don't know how it happened. I don't know how I let it happen. It all seemed to… make sense… at the time."

That was a lie. It had not made sense. Little had made sense in those days, so he held tight to what he _did_ know for certain. That mages were dangerous and it was his duty to make sure they didn't hurt anyone else.

And if something happened to trip him up and pull him out of the current for a moment? He had pushed it away. Temporary changes built up on one another. The more they did the worse the mages became, and the worse they became the harsher Cullen had needed to be, and weakness would have doomed them all, and _Cullen would not be weak_. The way the Circle was progressing had developed its own momentum, and the thought of stopping or changing was not to be dwelt on, because _how_?

So he had to stay the course, it HAD to be the right path, because there seemed to be no earthly way he could _stop_ it.

"Cullen," Hawke said slowly. "You… don't… know?"

Cullen shuddered and pressed his shoulder against the cold, hard stone of the wall. He had no answer. How had it happened? What had made him think it was all appropriate? Hawke stood there, waiting for an answer, and he had no idea what to say. He remained miserably silent.

"It was my fault," he managed eventually. His nose was running. "I regret – it was – I was wrong."

He didn't look at Hawke as he waited for the mage to respond _. Hasn't the man got what he wanted?_ Cullen thought dully _. Just let this be over_. How was Cullen going to be able to move forward and past this? At times like this his mistakes, his sins, seemed to blot out all of his future.

And yet, he had a job to do. Hadn't he said he was going to try and make up for it?

"Not _solely_ your fault," Hawke said, after a long, cold, excruciating moment. His voice was remote. "But yes, you were. All right."

He walked away a little distance, on the pretext of retrieving his staff from where it had fallen, allowing Cullen a moment to compose himself. Cullen drew himself back up to standing, wiped his face on his sleeve, settled his breathing. He looked over at the mage, a lean armoured figure studiously examining his staff as if he thought there might be something wrong with it. Little drifts of snow were beginning to stay unmelted against the wall.

"I will speak to… to Kelwin," Cullen said hoarsely. "You are right. I have deceived her. I never lied to her, not truly, but I wanted…" He made a helpless gesture. "I had liked that she did not know. That I could have something that was not tainted by Kirkwall."

"Really," Hawke said drily. "Trying to get away from the 'taint' of the Gallows. So you took up with the first mage you saw. How's that working out for you?"

"I am tainted," Cullen rasped. "Always. But she wasn't. She didn't… look at me and think of those things. She sees me as who I am now, not what I have done. But you are right." He rubbed his fists into his eyes. "Why do you have to be so damnably right?"

"It's a burden I must bear," Hawke said. When Cullen looked up, he had a sour set to his mouth, but his expression lacked the contempt it had had a fine minutes ago.

"I always thought," Hawke said, after a long moment, "That you should have been better, Cullen. The others were rotten to the core, but I thought you could have been different. It disappointed me more than I could say when it turned out you weren't."

Cullen winced. _Rotten to the core._ He would not even have described Meredith like that. Not in the beginning. "We were all trying to do what we thought was right," Cullen said. "The others as much as me. We failed. But I am trying not to be the man who thinks those things any more, Hawke. I am trying."

"That's… a start." Hawke spun his staff in his hands, absently, as if it was a habit while he thought. "But, Cullen – how much is that going to help if you go back to the same institution that made you into that in the first place? You still train templars. I can see what they are even if they're not in the armour, you know."

"The templars are more than this," Cullen said. "We are better than – what happened in Kirkwall. They _can_ _be_ better." He gestured in defeat with his hand. He did not want the conflict to reignite, would probably crumple if it did, but some things needed to be said. "Hawke, I will concede your point on many things, but I will not be moved on this. The Templar Order and the Circles are a necessary and beneficial part of the world. It is for the mages' sake as much as anybody else's that I wish them to continue." He looked up. "You believe me in that, don't you, Hawke?"

Hawke kicked at the drifts of snow, looking disgusted. "I believe that _you_ believe that, Cullen."

"Well," Cullen said. He gave a weak smile. "That is a start, I suppose."

"The Herald," Hawke said abruptly.

Cullen looked away. "I said I would speak to her. I will… find a time."

"Good," Hawke said. "I'll know if you don't." He spun the staff, slung it onto his back. He strode over to the wall that overlooked wilderness and rocky slopes and raised his voice. "I expect we'll see each other around Skyhold, Cullen. We can talk more later." He put his hand on the gap between crenellations, boosted himself up onto the wall, and jumped off, disappearing down with a flash of leather clothing and a flare of magic.

Cullen stared after him. The sweat was drying on his body and he felt very, very cold, and alone. More alone than he had since the first time he and Kelwin had come up to this very place to talk. _I will find a moment, and we will speak of the things I have done._


End file.
